1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to improvements in a sunroof structure for an automotive vehicle, and more particularly to an installation structure of a guide rail along which a sunroof lid is slidably guided.
2. Description of the Prior Art
It is well known that an automotive vehicle is provided with a sunroof structure including a guide rail along which a sunroof lid is slidably guided. The guide rail is disposed under the sunroof lid and along a side peripheral section of a roof opening of a roof panel. Such an arrangement is disclosed, for example, in Japanese Patent provisional Publication Nos. 62-85716 and 62-59119. The roof panel having the roof opening is reinforced by a side reinforcement member disposed under the roof panel and near the roof opening. The lower section of the side reinforcement member is bent to extend outward of the vehicle.
With this arrangement, the outward bent lower section of the side reinforcement member tends to interfere with the inner periphery of a roof side rail during joining of the roof panel to the roof side rail. Therefore, it is required that the outward bent section and the roof side rail do not interfere with each other by reducing the dimension of the roof opening in the direction of vehicle width. This reduces the substantial opening area of the roof opening and the head clearance of a passenger under shift of the guide rail toward the center side of a passenger room. Furthermore, in case that the guide rail and a drip channel receiving a water are connected to the side reinforcement member, their loads are received by the roof panel connected to the side reinforcement member. Therefore, the rigidity of the roof panel cannot be sufficiently gained although the roof panel is partly reinforced by the side reinforcement member. Additionally, this causes a slight deformation of the roof opening thereby making difficult fitting of the sunroof lid within the roof opening. Therefore, the sealing performance and appearance are deteriorated thus lowering the quality of the automotive vehicle.